page_title: 2nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment (1898)
section_title: Santiago Campaign
hierarchical_section_title: 2nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment (1898) / History / Santiago Campaign
caption_attribution_description: English: Entrenched camp of the 2nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry during the Siege of Santiago in 1898
context_page_description: The 2nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment was an infantry unit of the United States Army, mustered into Federal service during the Spanish–American War.
  It was one of three state volunteer regiments that fought in the Santiago Campaign in Cuba, and the only volunteer unit at the Battle of El Caney. The regiment participated in the Siege of Santiago until the city surrendered, spent several weeks in Cuba, and was moved back to the United States as a result of disease in August. After the end of a quarantine period the regiment was placed on leave and mustered out at the end of the period of leave in early November.
context_section_description: The transports sailed from Tampa on 14 June and arrived at Daiquirí, Cuba on 20 June, before the regiment began landing there on 22 June, with Company E being the first ashore. The landings were part of the Santiago Campaign, an attempt by the Fifth Army Corps to capture the city of Santiago de Cuba. Clark was temporarily placed in command of the brigade after its commander, Colonel James J. Van Horn, was seriously injured during the landing operation. When the rest of the brigade landed, excluding the 3rd Battalion of the 2nd Massachusetts, which landed on the next day and joined the regiment around noon, it advanced four miles into the interior, after which it bivouacked for the night. Early on the morning of 23 June, the brigade resumed the advance, arriving at Siboney, a village on the road to Santiago, just before noon. On 24 June Clark brought the 8th and 22nd Infantry to reinforce dismounted United States cavalry engaged in the Battle of Las Guasimas, but arrived as the engagement was ending; the 2nd Massachusetts was left behind to guard Siboney. In the late afternoon the advance was resumed, halting on the Las Guasimas battlefield at dark. Company G, which had remained at Siboney in order to unload supplies from the ships, reached the bivouac early the next morning, allowing the advance to be resumed.
  The regiment fought in the Battle of El Caney on 1 July. The regiment, along with the 9th Massachusetts and the 71st New York, was among three state volunteer regiments to fight in combat during the Santiago Campaign and the only one to fight at El Caney. During the engagement, the brigade, commanded by Brigadier General William Ludlow, was positioned southwest of the village of El Caney next to the main road. The regiment was armed with the black powder burning single-shot .45-caliber Springfield rifle, whose smoke revealed their positions to Spanish troops.  Clark later wrote that no unit had ever gone into combat under worse conditions, as 55% of his men were untrained recruits. The 2nd Massachusetts was ordered to halt its advance and instead hold its positions by Ludlow due to the inferiority of its armament. The regiment lost one officer killed and three wounded, and four enlisted men killed in action, three died of wounds, and 33 wounded.
  The regiment and the Second Division began marching towards San Juan Hill to reinforce the First Division in the Siege of Santiago before 6:00 pm, and bivouacked by the roadside at 9:00 pm. They resumed the march at 3:00 am, and the regiment reached the road at El Pozo mill under heavy fire from Spanish snipers, holding positions on a hill at the extreme right flank of the line. A Spanish attack was repulsed around 10:00 pm, although the regiment lost four enlisted men wounded, one mortally. The regiment received the news of the naval victory at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba on the afternoon 3 July, and advanced to the right, taking positions on a hill dominating the rear of the city in order to completely encircle it on 4 July. There, the regiment began digging breastworks, using knives, spoons, and mess plates and cups due to a shortage of entrenching tools.
  The regiment remained in these positions until 10 July, when it relieved Cuban auxiliaries in trenches further to the right. That afternoon, United States artillery opened fire as a temporary truce expired. The regiment was moved to the right again on 11 July and finished the encirclement of the city on the next day, with the right of the brigade on the harbor on the north side of the city. At the last position, the regiment dug trenches until they were completed on the morning of 14 July, within a few hundred yards of the Spanish lines. It was ordered into the trenches and prepared for action at 11:20 am that day, but the city surrendered shortly afterwards. When the formal surrender took place three days later, the regiment paraded in front of its trenches.
caption: Entrenched camp of the regiment during the Siege of Santiago
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